Welcome to a weekly look at the NFL’s next round of games. A peek that will be less quarterback-crazy and more about offensive lines, defense, running games, maybe even the occasional punter, for gosh sakes, and all things that make this the greatest team game ever invented, not the star-driven individualized sport that too many of us try to make it out to be. An effort will be made to keep the tone somewhere between “Old-School” and “Get off my lawn!”
@#$#%! Kickers! In the NFC’s Game of the Week, the Rams (6-2) head to San Francisco (6-3) as a Super Bowl contender.
Nothing gripes an old-school guy worse than a lousy kicker. Ain’t that right, Zim?
And, well, the Rams have the worst of the NFL’s worst kicking operations. In this, the Year of the Blocked Kick, the Rams and Joshua Karty are in most of the blooper reels.
“It can’t continue like this; it’s gone on far too long,” said Rams coach Sean McVay, a beacon of NFL new-schoolers whose steadfast belief in Karty finally wavered this week after eight games.
The Rams signed to their practice squad Harrison Mevis, a 23-year-old from Missouri with no NFL regular-season kicking experience, a 5-11, 243-pound frame and a cool nickname — The Thiccer Kicker. They also signed veteran long-snapper Jake McQuaide, who was with the Vikings for four games last year.
McVay certainly seems ready to pull the chain on Karty. And why not?